We are delighted to announce that the NSA has voted to make Ken Turner an honorary member in celebration of his 100th birthday.
In a recent interview, Ken has said “I was an outsider right from my birth….’. Born in 1926, Ken is a painter and performance artist who brings an intellectual and cognitive approach to his version of outsider art. After serving during WWII and studying at the Anglo-French Art School in St John’s Wood, Ken co-founded the radical artists’ collective ‘Action Space’ in the late 1960s and edited Performance Magazine in the 1980s, both proving influential on contemporary arts practice. During the sixties, while living in Hampstead with a communist landlady and bringing up a young family, he added environmental sculpture to his practice. He moved to St Ives in the 90s and joined the NSA in 1994. His work is driven by the conviction that aesthetics must have a moral dimension, and he is widely read in Continental philosophy.
Time has not diminished his interest in art’s moral grounding and one of his recent pieces involved him driving a tank over a Tesla. You can find the footage on here https://www.youtube.com/shorts/CKnQo5ZyFqA.
The NSA is delighted to announce that celebrations for Ken’s centenary will take place across July, organised by Huw Wahl. We hope to see you at one of these events:
- Opening Event (the party!)
Exhibition Private View, Live Performance, Art Auction & Party
Saturday 25th July 2026 | 7pm – late
Wharfside Arts Hub, Wharfside Shopping Centre, Wharf Road, Penzance, TR18 2GB - Film Premiere
Expiry (2026)– directed by Huw Wahl (trailer)
Sun 26 July, 2pm, ticketed | Newlyn Filmhouse – booking
Shot entirely on expired 16mm film stock, this 2026 collaboration between Turner and his son – the filmmaker Huw Wahl – is not a retrospective piece, but a “love letter to ageing playfully,” asking what creative action looks like at the edge of a century. - Main Exhibition
KEN TURNER AT 100: A Century of Crashing Culture
23 July – 4 August 2026 | Tues – Sun 11am – 7pm | Free entry
Wharfside Arts Hub, Wharfside Shopping Centre, Wharf Road, Penzance, TR18 2GB
An exhibition that incorporates new painting, performance art, and film, and seeks to answer the question – how does an artist stay contemporary for a century? For Ken Turner – the UK’s oldest performance artist and painter – the answer lies in ongoing rebellion.
Open Studio
23 July – 4 August 2026 | Tues – Sun 11am – 4pm | Free entry
Anjou Barn, Trevalgan, St Ives, TR26 3BJ
More information about ‘KenFest100’ can be found here https://hctwahl.com/ken
